Background: Woman Suffrage Movement

The American woman's quest for equal rights with men began as early as 1818 with the work of a few pioneering women. The Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 is generally considered the beginning of the organized woman's rights movement. This convention called for a range of rights for women: equal education, equal treatment under the law, and the right to vote.

Leaders argued that women were citizens of the United States and that it was undemocratic to deny half the citizens a voice in their own government. After all, the U.S. Constitution stated the governed must give their consent.

By the twentieth century, the focus of the woman's rights movement narrowed to a single issue, votes for women. The main argument became that women should vote because it would benefit society. The movement gathered steam in the second decade of the twentieth century to become a national issue. In 1920, the 19th Amendment was added to the United States Constitution and the movement ended.